The Windsor developer behind the Grace Hospital long-term bed controversy has filed a lawsuit seeking $35 million, plus another $10 million in punitive damages, from the Ontario government and former MPP Dwight Duncan.

The suit was filed in Superior Court by a Hamilton lawyer representing Lou Vozza and his company, Grace Village Inc.

It accuses Ontario’s Health Ministry and Duncan — the province’s former finance minister — of being “reckless, malicious, vicious, callous, reprehensible, shocking, oppressive and high-handed.”

In June 2011, the province terminated an agreement with Vozza to build a long-term care home with 256 beds at the Grace site.

The statement of claim, a copy of which was obtained by The Star, seeks damages for “breach of contract, bad faith, conflict of interest and negligent misrepresentations.”

Statements of claim contain allegations not yet proven in court.

Vozza said Wednesday he did not want to discuss the lawsuit.

Developer Lou Vozza is seen in this file photo. (Jason Kryk/The Windsor Star)

“I’m going to defer to my lawyer,” he said.

His lawyer, George Limberis, said there are discussions with the government’s legal team over whether Duncan should be named in the lawsuit, but no decision has yet been made.

Duncan said he was acting in his role with the government and should not be named.

“I was part of the government and covered by that,” he said  Wednesday. “I’m being represented on this by the government, so I don’t have any comment on it.”

Toronto lawyer Ronald Carr is handling the lawsuit on behalf of the provincial government and did not respond Wednesday to a message from The Star. He has not yet filed a statement of defence. Limberis believes he has roughly another month to do so.

Vozza, due to financial troubles, has since lost his ownership of the Grace site — first to creditors and then to the city after about $1 million in municipal back taxes on the property were not paid. The former hospital was recently demolished at a cost of $4.1 million to be paid by the province.

Work was continuing Wednesday on the site to remove the foundations.

Limberis said Vozza was “very distraught” over the Grace controversy and “lost a lot of faith in the system.

“He was just pushed aside when he felt he did everything possible to help the city of Windsor and also help alleviate any concerns the provincial government had,” his lawyer said. “I believe he feels a little betrayed.

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“The problem here is Mr. Vozza was provided a number of assurances by the government if he played ball, but the rug was pulled out from him. Then afterwards the help he asked for was given to other people who they gave the project to. If the government gave (Vozza) that in the beginning a lot of his problems would never have been experienced.”

The long-term care project — valued at about $35 million — was eventually awarded by the Health Ministry to Schlegel Villages which is building a four-storey structure on the grounds of St. Clair College.

Vozza’s lawsuit alleges about $3 million of money up-front was given to Schlegel to seal the deal. Vozza was not to receive anything until construction at Grace was complete.

The suit calls for the money invested by Vozza on the Grace project to be returned.

It alleges Vozza has suffered “lost profits, unnecessary expenses, loss of goodwill and loss of equity.”

A breakdown was to be provided in court filings to follow, the suit said.

Vozza was initially awarded the project at the Grace site in 2007 as part of an announcement that the city was getting funding for the development of 448 long-term care beds.

Vozza’s contracting company Concorde was awarded 160 of those beds for the Grace site in an agreement completed in January 2008.

The suit alleges the Health Ministry demanded Vozza roll the long-term bed project into his own company instead of creating a separate entity. He warned ministry officials that rolling the project into his own company “may risk completion of the development agreement,” the lawsuit said.

The ministry said it understood, but refused to look at other options, the lawsuit said.

Then the global financial crisis hit in the fall of 2008. Vozza could not complete financing due to “many of Concorde’s projects and payments being delayed.” That created financial and legal troubles for the Grace project, the lawsuit said.

In December 2008, Extendicare pulled out of its commitment to build 128 long-term care beds in Windsor “which embarrassed the Windsor government representatives” who feared they might “suffer political and social damage,” the lawsuit said.

In mid-January 2009, Vozza was summoned to Duncan’s constituency office where the former MPP asked if he could take on another 96 beds.

Vozza responded that would cause “issues” by requiring remodelling of the project, new site plans and architectural drawings. He told Duncan he was already experiencing financial difficulties outside of the Grace project.

Duncan said the Health Ministry would co-operate with approvals of new drawings and paperwork in a timely manner, according to the lawsuit.

The lawsuit alleges Duncan told Vozza that “as a ‘good Liberal’ Lou should accept the additional beds as it would not be forgotten.”

Vozza agreed to accept the extra beds.

If not for Duncan’s urging, “the plaintiff would not have agreed to the additional beds,” the lawsuit said.

Vozza then poured his resources into reworking the project to accommodate more beds.

He sent the ministry drawings, but then could not get financing  until June 2010. It was subject to conditions of an approved site plan control agreement and building permits being finalized.

But Vozza could not get new drawings approved by the ministry despite “repeated requests” for an answer, the lawsuit said.

In July 2010, according to the lawsuit, Vozza met with then-MPP Sandra Pupatello and told her of his frustrations with the ministry. The ministry soon after provided conditional approval of his drawings.

But Sun Life, the financial backer, said it wanted the project transferred to separate entity away from Vozza’s company for liability reasons and that created more delays, the lawsuit said.

In February 2011, Vozza met in a Bay Street office in Toronto with Health Ministry officials where he told them he needed to move the project to a separate company in order to get financing.

The ministry officials said the agreement would not allow for that. Vozza reminded them he only rolled the project into his company at their request, the lawsuit said.

In the spring of 2011, everything was in place for the project except financing.

But on May 20, Vozza received a warning letter from the ministry about the project, the suit said.

Then a month later a rented crane was removed from the Grace site for nonpayment by Vozza.

The lawsuit alleges Duncan on June 22, 2011 — at the urging of an email by his former top aide Windsor Coun. Al Maghnieh — announced he would cancel the project within 48 hours if Vozza could not secure financing. Maghnieh’s email allegedly expressed concern about the Liberals losing the Windsor West riding in a coming provincial election because of the Grace issue.

“The plaintiff pleads this was a complete shock,” the lawsuit said. It was in contradiction to Duncan’s previous vows to Vozza.

The Grace project agreement was terminated two days later.

Repeated attempts by Vozza to contact Duncan were “ignored,” the lawsuit said.

It accuses Duncan of making remarks in his office to Vozza “outside his duty as MPP” and “for his own benefit.”

“Consequently, the plaintiff pleads that (Duncan) is personally liable for any negligent misrepresentation made to the plaintiff,” the suit said.

It concludes: “The defendants engaged in a course of conduct which did not abide by community standards of honesty, reasonableness or fairness.”

The surveillance video that shows a Windsor police officer punching and kicking a man lying on the floor speaks for itself, says the prosecutor in the case.

Const. Kent Rice kicking Gladson Chinyangwa on Feb. 22, 2012.

“This force was not applied for the purposes of arrest. This force was applied as an assault,” assistant Crown attorney David Foulds said in court Thursday.

“There was no lawful reason for this application of force.”

Foulds made the comments in his closing arguments in the trial of Windsor police officer Const. Kent Rice.

Rice, 41, is facing one count of assault for an incident that happened Feb. 22, 2012, in the stairwell of a low-income apartment building at 1101 McDougall St.

A security camera captured Rice throwing and connecting with one hand strike and two kicks on Gladson Chinyangwa, then 20, as he lay on the stairwell floor.

Rice and his lawyer Andrew Bradie contend that the blows were delivered in the normal course of arresting Chinyangwa, who was supposedly breaching the peace and not co-operating.

But Foulds asked the judge to simply review the video. “Is that the body language of a combative, potentially assaultive person? Lying in a heap … on the floor?”

Const. Kent Rice in a 2007 file photo. (The Windsor Star)

Foulds pointed out Rice did not mention the second kick in his original notes on the incident — an “intentional omission,” Foulds said. “Not forgetfulness.”

“What I’m going to suggest to you is that you could never have justified a second kick,” Foulds told Rice in court.

Foulds asked the judge to notice how Rice’s behaviour in the video changes the moment he apparently becomes aware of the security camera. Foulds pointed to how Rice adjusts his headwear and turns his back to the camera.

“It’s like a light bulb went off. ‘Oops! Maybe I shouldn’t be hammering this guy, tuning him up,’” Foulds said.

Foulds said that if Rice’s true intention was to arrest Chinyangwa, he would have done it immediately upon entering the stairwell, as Chinyangwa lay on the floor — the “ideal position” to cuff an arrest subject.

Instead, Rice stood over Chinyangwa and struck him. “The video speaks for itself, Mr. Rice,” Foulds said.

Earlier in the trial, officers testified that Chinyangwa was being loudly belligerent and verbally abusive enough to impede their investigation, and that’s why Rice took Chinyangwa out of an apartment, into a corridor, and then into the stairwell.

Gladson Chinyangwa in a Facebook image.

But Foulds said the timeline of communications between the officers and dispatchers shows that only a few minutes elapsed from their entry of the apartment to Chinyangwa’s removal — not enough time for Chinyangwa to cause the trouble attributed to him.

Foulds pointed out that in the audio playback of those communications, no yelling or shouting can be heard in the background.

According to Foulds, all four of the officers who testified in the trial embellished the truth — and Chinyangwa was “not nearly as unco-operative” as they have suggested.

Foulds alleged that the real reason Rice took Chinyangwa into the stairwell was to extract information. Specifically, he wanted to learn the identity of one of the other people in the apartment.

“You punched him, and you kicked him twice, and you said ‘Give me the name, give me the name,’” Foulds told Rice.

“You got into Chinyangwa’s face to get the name.”

Const. Kent Rice on Aug. 6, 2013. (The Windsor Star)

But Bradie argued that Rice acted “with lawful authority.”

Bradie said Chinyangwa, by his own admission, was “in a mood that night.”

“He was continually told to comply,” Bradie said.

Rice himself took the stand on Thursday morning to describe what happened.

According to Rice, the video doesn’t capture what Chinyangwa was saying to him: Expletives and slurs, a challenge to fight, a warning that “It’s on,” and the line: “Good luck cuffing me, pig.”

Rice said the reason he pushed Chinyangwa through the door, resulting in Chinyangwa falling to the floor, was that Chinyangwa had become “enraged” and “emotionally-charged.”

Rice said he felt Chinyangwa’s body tense. “I knew he was going to try to hit me.”

Rice said that when he entered the stairwell, he bent over Chinyangwa and spoke in a “hushed” tone as part of a calming technique, meant to encourage “active listening.” He said the only thing he told Chinyangwa was to stand up and be arrested.

A frame from the Feb. 22, 2012 security video.

Rice said the “open palm deflection” on Chinyangwa’s chin was necessary because he heard Chinyangwa make a “horking” sound. “I’m familiar with the sound,” Rice said. “I’ve been spit on before.”

Rice said the two “leg strikes” weren’t meant to injure or incapacitate. He said he believed Chinyangwa’s intention at that point was to flee the building. “They were measured kicks,” Rice testified. “I wasn’t trying to hurt him. I was just trying to gain compliance.”

As for why Rice didn’t immediately arrest Chinyangwa on the floor, Rice said it’s been his experience that trying to cuff grounded subjects often leads to them resisting harder and escalating the situation.

“I like to see them on their feet. I like for them to be co-operative,” Rice told the court.

But Foulds did not believe Rice’s testimony.

Regarding the “pig” line Rice attributed to Chinyangwa, Foulds said, bluntly: “You just made that up.”

Justice Donald Downie said he will deliberate overnight and present his judgement 2 p.m. Friday.

Related articles

• Trial begins on Windsor cop’s stairwell incident
• Alleged victim of police assault claims he was cooperating
• Alleged assault victim was about to spit at officer, argues officer’s lawyer
• Partner of accused officer exaggerating to help him, says prosecutor

dchen@windsorstar.com

The regional supervising coroner has announced that an inquest into the 2011 workplace death of Takis Escoto will be held starting Oct. 28.

Escoto, 34, died after being struck by a front-end loader at a construction site in Windsor on June 1, 2011. Coco Paving, Escoto’s employer, pleaded guilty to one count of failing to carry out property safety measures and received a a $212,505 combined fine and surcharge in January.

Inquests into workplace fatalities are mandatory under the Coroners Act. The inquest will investigate the circumstances of Escoto’s death and the jury may make recommendations with the goal of preventing similar incidents from happening in the future.

The inquest will begin at 10 a.m. on Oct. 28 at the provincial courthouse at 200 Chatham St. E. in Windsor. It is scheduled to last for four days and hear testimony from seven witnesses.

The inquest coroner will be Curis Fedoruk and his counsel will be Frank Schwalm.

The Windsor police officer who was caught on camera punching and kicking a man lying on a floor has been found guilty.

Const. Kent Rice, 41, was convicted of one count of assault for an incident that happened during the early morning hours of Feb. 22, 2012, in the stairwell of a low-income apartment building at 1101 McDougall St.

A surveillance video camera recorded Rice delivering one hand strike and two kicks to Gladson Chinyangwa, then 20, as Chinyangwa writhed on the stairwell floor.

Justice Donald Downie, a judge based outside of Windsor, handed down the verdict on Friday afternoon. Downie said the two kicks to Chinyangwa were excessive force and constitute assault. Downie said there were “varying stories,” but the surveillance video recording “tells its own story” and was “the tie-breaker.”

There were five trial days, with testimony from Rice, three fellow officers, and Chinyangwa.

Rice was charged criminally in June 2012, months after the incident — when the surveillance video recording came under public scrutiny.

The trial revealed that the video was brought to the attention of Windsor Residence Inc., the non-profit housing organization that owns and operates 1101 McDougall St.

A member of the organization’s board of directors leaked the video to the media.

As a Windsor police officer, Rice is also facing charges under the Police Services Act.

He was suspended with pay on June 6, 2012.

The Police Act hearings were postponed for the resolution of the criminal case.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AwZYRBc4qD0

Related articles

• Windsor cop’s stairwell incident was about assault – not arrest, says prosecutor
• Partner of accused officer exaggerating to help him, says prosecutor
• Alleged assault victim was about to spit at officer, argues officer’s lawyer
• Alleged victim of police assault claims he was cooperating
• Trial begins on Windsor cop’s stairwell incident

dchen@windsorstar.com

A sobbing crack addict said he’d do his best to make his mom proud Wednesday, before going to prison for her savage, drug-fuelled murder.

Jason Glen Coffey was sentenced to life in prison with no hope of parole for 13 years in the slaying of his 63-year-old mother Florence. He beat her, stabbed her more than 40 times and left her bleeding to death on her bedroom floor.

“I took the life of the woman who always tried to protect me and shelter me from anything bad,” Coffey said in court. “That woman was my mom. She always tried to see the good in everyone, especially me.”

“I don’t think I will ever be able to forgive myself for what I did. I took my mom’s life. It should have been me that died.”

Coffey, 41, pleaded guilty in June to second-degree murder, which carries a life sentence. Superior Court Justice Bruce Thomas decided Wednesday Coffey won’t be eligible for parole for 13 years.

Coffey killed his mother Florence early on July 13, 2012,  just a couple of days after she’d taken him in. His father, weary from the drugs, lies and stealing, didn’t want him there.

Jason Coffey, a Windsor man who stabbed his mother to death was sentenced to life in prison Wed. Sept. 4, 2013, in Windsor, Ont. His father Jack Coffey, front, and sister Gerilyn Pettitt leave the Superior court after the sentencing. (DAN JANISSE/The Windsor Star)

Coffey had been on a fevered crack cocaine binge when, clutching a kitchen knife and his father’s fish fileting knife, he slipped into his mother’s bedroom at 564 Oak Ave.

He plunged the knives into his sleeping mother more than 40 times, inflicting wounds up to 14.5 centimetres deep. Florence also suffered blunt force trauma all over her face and head, and even inside her ears.

When the attack was done, Coffey cut the phone lines to his mother’s room. He rifled through her purse for cash, debit cards and car keys, then went to buy drugs.

“The crime is horrific,” said Thomas. “Florence Coffey bled to death from 40 stab wounds inflicted by her son while she lay in bed.”

Coffey did this, said Thomas, to feed his “insatiable” appetite for crack cocaine.

“It’s trite to say that crack cocaine is a scourge,” he said. “It’s a blazing, exhilarating high, but its effects are brief and elusive.

“To what depths will a crack addict sink to feed his habit? Mr. Coffey appears to have answered that.”

Defence lawyer Andrew Bradie asked for parole eligibility after 12 years. The mandatory minimum for second-degree murder is 10 years.

He said Coffey, who is having nightmares about his mom, has shown remorse by pleading guilty, accepting responsibility and saving his family from the torture of a trial.

Coffey also wrote a cautionary letter to be used in Chatham-Kent school drug programs.

“I don’t think we can truly believe unless we’ve been in his shoes the reality, the sad never-ending reality, of having killed his mother,” said Bradie. “He loved her and she loved him. That’s something that’s never going to change. In some respects I wonder how a person even gets out of bed in the morning with that weight on his shoulders. No doubt, he brought it upon himself. He brought pain and sorrow upon his family. But the fact of the matter is he has to live with that every day.”

Assistant Crown attorney Elizabeth Brown asked for parole eligibility at the “higher end” of the 12 to 15 year range.  Drugs may have played a role in the murder, she said, but he chose to take them.

She said Coffey continued to take drugs at the expense of everything else in his life — including his children, former common-law wife and parents — for 20 years.

“My emphasis was on the court considering the moral culpability of Mr. Coffey and the choices he did make,” said Brown. “The choices he made with relation to getting clean, with continuing on with a 20-year drug addiction. Putting himself in situations and continuing to be in situations that led him to where he is today.”

She said Coffey’s choices have destroyed his family. They didn’t write victim impact statements, she said, because they couldn’t translate their grief into words.

“To have this loving, caring, supportive mother taken away — by your brother and your son – has obviously put this family in a situation of much turmoil and pain and suffering,” she said. “They love their son, they love their brother. But the loss of their mother has caused them the type of reaction that they weren’t even able to put into words.”

Before sentencing, Coffey pledged to get clean, turn his life around and work to keep others away from drugs, something his mother had wanted for 20 years. He also apologized to his father Jack and sister Gerilyn Pettitt, who were in court. They haven’t spoken to him since the murder.

“I love and miss them all so much and I understand they never want to speak to me again,” said Coffey, who was often hard to hear through his sobs. “I hope one day I will be forgiven. But I don’t expect it.”

Follow me on Twitter: @WinStarWilhelm

A drug trafficking trial took an unusual turn on Thursday when a Windsor police officer’s credibility was questioned due to his recent guilty plea on an unrelated theft charge.

“I understand that I committed an offence,” said Const. Timothy Kettlewell on the witness stand. “I am guilty.”

Kettlewell, 38, was called to testify in the trial of Ziad Chafchak, who is facing two counts of possessing cocaine for the purpose of trafficking.

Windsor lawyer Patrick Ducharme in a 2013 file photo. (The Windsor Star)

But Chafchak’s lawyer, Patrick Ducharme, grilled Kettlewell on the veteran officer’s own legal troubles — a charge of possession of stolen property, to which Kettlewell pleaded guilty last month.

“You were caught red-handed?” Ducharme asked.

“Correct,” Kettlewell replied.

According to a court transcript, on April 10 of this year Kettlewell and his partner recovered a satchel that had been stolen from a local Catholic school principal.

In the course of checking the satchel’s contents, Kettlewell took two Lotto MAX tickets that had been purchased by the principal.

Four days later, Kettlewell tried to redeem the tickets at a Mac’s convenience store in Windsor.

A surveillance camera recorded Kettlewell at the Mac’s, taking the tickets out of his wallet and signing them as if they were his own.

An officer investigating the theft of the satchel saw the video and confronted Kettlewell about it.

Kettlewell later turned himself in at police headquarters. He was suspended with pay.

On Aug. 16, Kettlewell pleaded guilty. His lawyer described the taking of the lottery tickets as “an act of inadvertence.”

The court heard that Kettlewell — a father of three — was going through “the breakdown of his family and the estrangement of his wife and some incredible financial obligations, which he could not meet.” He filed for bankruptcy earlier this year.

The court also heard that Kettlewell had “turned to alcohol” as a crutch and “was not thinking straight” at the time of the incident.

Immediately after his arrest, he checked into the Homewood Substance Abuse Program and underwent a five-week in-house treatment.

Kettlewell’s sentence was a conditional discharge with 12 months probation — meaning that his admission of guilt did not result in a criminal conviction.

“There is no point in me lecturing you,” Justice Ross Webster told Kettlewell at the sentencing. “I try not to lecture people if I know that they have had enough lecturing and they know exactly what the situation is. I know you do.”

But on Thursday, Ducharme pressed Kettlewell about his error. “You knew they were not your tickets. You knew they were stolen by you,” Ducharme said.

Kettlewell maintained that “it hadn’t even crossed my mind” the tickets belonged to someone else.

Ducharme dismissed Kettlewell’s rationalizations as “gibberish,” and questioned if he understood the charge to which he had pleaded guilty.

Regarding Kettlewell’s stint at Homewood, Ducharme said: “This is a convenient place to go for officers who are caught red-handed and want to blame it on alcohol, isn’t it?”

Ducharme asked Kettlewell if he had a drinking problem at the time of the alleged offences of Chafchak — April and May 2008.

Kettlewell said no.

Kettlewell said he has since found help for his depression and diabetes. “I’m in a better place now with my life,” said Kettlewell, who has been a Windsor police officer for 15 years.

Supt. John St. Louis of Windsor police in a 2013 file photo. (The Windsor Star)

Supt. John St. Louis of Windsor police said on Thursday that Kettlewell still has to face charges under the Police Act, but a hearing date has yet to be set.

Until then, Kettlewell remains suspended with pay.

St. Louis said Chief Al Frederick and senior levels of Windsor police have been on record about the need for officers “to keep, maintain and increase the trust of the public.”

“Anything that goes to diminish that trust, lessen that trust — is a cause for concern,” St. Louis said.

Chafchak’s trial will resume in January 2014.

The Curious Case of Ziad Chafchak

On May 15, 2008, Windsor police arrested Ziad Chafchak in the 800 block of Louis Avenue.

Led by Const. Timothy Kettlewell — who was then a member of the drugs and guns unit — officers took Chafchak out of his silver BMW and searched him, uncovering five baggies containing a total of 2.5 grams of cocaine.

Chafchak was subsequently charged with two counts of possession for the purpose of trafficking.

But the arrest was far from his first encounter with the Windsor Police Service.

Ziad Chafchak, 42, in a 2013 file photo. (The Windsor Star)

In Chafchak’s trial, the court has heard that he acted as a police informant for 16 years.

According to Chafchak’s lawyer Patrick Ducharme, police databases show Chafchak has had 86 contacts with officers — none of them resulting in convictions against Chafchak.

As well, Chafchak has had at least 75 traffic tickets waived.

Ducharme has suggested that the reason Windsor police arrested his client five years ago was payback: Chafchak gave up too much information.

It’s Ducharme’s contention that tips supplied by Chafchak resulted in the investigation of Const. Michael Shannon of Windsor police.

A sting operation by RCMP caught Shannon stealing $425 from an undercover officer.

Shannon pleaded guilty in 2008 to charges of theft and breach of trust. The court heard he has struggled with alcohol and drug abuse throughout his life.

Chafchak’s trial continues.

dchen@windsorstar.com

A drug mule serving three years for smuggling ecstasy into the U.S. testified from an American prison Monday that she became part of  a sting operation following her arrest in Detroit to implicate the Windsor man on trial for masterminding the conspiracy.

In a television link from prison in Connecticut, Mary Ann Habib told a Superior Court judge she was “shocked” to learn, on the afternoon of Oct. 28, 2009, that a significant haul of MDMA, ecstasy, was stashed in the van she was asked to drive to Detroit.

After she was arrested Habib said she agreed to play a role in a police effort to round up others who may have been involved in the foiled drug deal.

As result of that investigation, involving both Canadian and US authorities, one of those suspects, Charbel Chibani, 34, faces charges of conspiracy to export ecstasy from Canada.

Habib said she was asked to set up conversations and a meeting with the man who was believed to have shipped the drug and the one was expected to take delivery.  Habib took part in several monitored and recorded phone calls with parties on both sides of the border, including Chibani.

However, Chibani’s lawyer, Laura Joy, spent much of the day in court cross-examining Habib to suggest that the young woman had made a deal with the authorities to implicate her client in exchange for a reduced sentence after pleading guilty in Detroit to lesser charges. S

She noted that Habib originally faced a possible sentence of up to 10 years for conspiracy to import, and her subsequent participation in the investigation could not be relied upon because it was motivated by self-interest.

“You were engaging in plea discussions because you were informed your co-operation could form the basis for a sentence reduction,” Joy suggested.

“I don’t recall being told I could get a reduction because of it,” replied Habib. “My lawyer said if a took a plea to a lesser charge I could get less time…. It had nothing to do with any co-operation.”

But Joy pointed out that Habib insists she did not know the drugs were in the van and that she was innocent.

Habib agreed but said she was told by her American public defender that she was likely to be convicted due to the strength of evidence against her and was advised to seek a plea bargain on a lesser charge.

In her testimony, Habib said she met Chibani earlier in the day, along with another man named Amid and was asked to take the van across the border. Initially, she said, she was supposed to have travelled with someone else but that other person never showed up.

She said Amid gave her the keys to a van parked in a church parking lot, and she drove it through the tunnel to Detroit.

She said she was stopped at primary inspection and sent to secondary, but she didn’t think there was anything to worry about because she was stopped nearly every time she travelled to Detroit, suggesting it was because of her Arabic name.

She said she was having a cordial conversation with customs officers about Detroit Lions football when another agent kicked open the door and announced: “We go a load of E.”

After an hour and a half U.S. agents brought in monitoring equipment and her cellphone, which they reported had been “ringing off the hook.” She called Chibani. The recorded phone call was played back in court.

When she reached him she said her phone had died and that was why it had taken her so long to call: Chirbani replies:”You f—-ng b—–, don’t do that shit again or I” f— you up.” He states he was worried.

She asks, “why would you be worried about me.”

He replies that he really wasn’t.

In a later call he wants to know if she “got stopped.” Again, she asks if there is something she should be worried about. He replies that there’s nothing to worry about.

Then the investigators have Habib phone the Michigan contact. She agrees to meet a man named “Moe” near Dearborn. But at the rendezvous, he is arrested, and police enact a second arrest of Habib, to convince the man that she was not involved in the sting operation.

Then, together, the two call Chibani. His part of the phone call was not recorded but, Joy suggested he never mentioned drugs or implicated himself in the conversation.

Habib agreed. But, she suggested, “Maybe he realized I did get pulled over and figured it out.”

A convicted online predator who has occasional violent sexual fantasies involving young boys is a “moderate to high risk” to reoffend and should be declared a dangerous offender, a prosecutor said Monday.

Assistant Crown attorney Gary Nokita said Steven Slade was engaged in sexual online chats with someone he thought was a 15-year-old boy soon after getting out of jail in 2011 and wondered whether it was “humanly possible” to supervise him if he was free on probation.

“Just 17 days after being released this individual was on the Internet, then gets on a bus to meet someone, “Nokita said. “It was an attempt that might have led to violence. There was an intent. There is a disturbing pattern of him attempting to contact underage boys.

“He has told officers he doesn’t know if he can control his sexual urges.”

Slade, a 44-year-old former Windsor resident, had been free on probation for just over two weeks in December 2011 after serving time for crimes related to child porn and pursuing sex with boys when he made online contact with police posing as a teenage boy.

Slade, who was living in the Toronto area, arrived on a bus in Windsor on Feb. 1, 2012, wearing a diaper — another fetish — hoping to meet the fictional teen, but was arrested by officers.

Nokita submitted 3,000 pages of documents on the trial’s first day to Justice Lloyd Dean detailing Slade’s history with child pornography and online chats dating back to 2008. Nikota said the documents detail Slade’s sexual — and occasionally violent — fantasies about boys as young as 10.

He described Slade as a “moderate to high risk” to reoffend.

Nokita said that during the trial he will spell out why Slade should be declared a dangerous offender, which would keep him behind bars indefinitely. But he also plans to provide Dean with options for his long-term legal supervision as a possible alternative.

Slade’s lawyer Kevin Shannon said labelling his client as a “dangerous offender” is overly harsh –  there is no evidence he physically assaulted or hurt anyone.

Nokita conceded while he can not provide evidence that Slade assaulted anyone, his twisted fantasies — which include examples of mutilation — should be enough to warrant designating him a dangerous offender.

Throughout the trial’s first day Slade — a short, rotund man with receding curly hair and glasses — betrayed little emotion as he sat in the prisoner’s box listening to the Crown’s evidence.

He has been in custody since his arrest last year. He pleaded guilty in June 2012 to Internet luring and breach of probation.

Dean recessed court Monday afternoon so he can spend the next few days reading the array of documents submitted by Nokita. The trial’s first witnesses are expected to take the stand Sept. 17.

Slade served his original two-year sentence in federal penitentiary for distributing child porn, Internet luring and counselling a minor to have sex with someone younger.

Andrew Welsh-Huggins, The Associated Press

COLUMBUS, Ohio – An Ohio driver who made an online video confessing to causing a fatal wrong-way crash after drinking heavily was scheduled to make his first court appearance Tuesday.

In a 3 1/2-minute video posted last week, Matthew Cordle admitted he killed a man from a Columbus suburb and said he “made a mistake” when he decided to drive that night.

“My name is Matthew Cordle, and on June 22nd, 2013, I hit and killed Vincent Canzani,” he says somberly. “This video will act as my confession.”

Cordle, of Powell, another Columbus suburb, was due to appear in Franklin County court Tuesday afternoon after being charged with aggravated vehicular homicide a day earlier and turning himself in. Cordle also is charged with a misdemeanour count of operating a vehicle under the influence of alcohol.

He could plead guilty as early as Tuesday but might also have to wait for his case to be assigned to a permanent judge.

Franklin County prosecutor Ron O’Brien said Cordle faces up to 8 1/2 years in prison if convicted.

Cordle’s attorneys on Monday downplayed any suggestion that Cordle made the video in hopes of winning a light sentence. But a harsh sentence could also send the wrong message to people trying to take responsibility for crimes, they said.

His attorneys said they hope he will be free on bond after pleading guilty but before being sentenced to continue to spread his anti-drunken driving message.

O’Brien previously said Cordle’s blood sample from the night of the crash tested positive for alcohol and negative for drugs. The indictment alleges Cordle’s blood-alcohol level was more than twice the level at which Ohio authorities generally consider a driver to be impaired.

Messages left with Canzani’s family were not immediately returned Monday. O’Brien said the family will be in court Tuesday. He said in similar cases, it would be common for him to ask for the maximum sentence.

The video was filmed Sept. 3, and the version posted on YouTube has been viewed more than 1.2 million times. It begins with Cordle’s face blurred as he describes how he has struggled with depression and was simply trying to have a good time with friends going “from bar to bar” the night of the accident. He then describes how he ended up driving into oncoming traffic on Interstate 670. Cordle’s face becomes clear as he reveals his name and confesses to killing Canzani.

He ends the video by pleading with viewers not to drink and drive.

“I can’t bring Mr. Canzani back, and I can’t erase what I’ve done, but you can still be saved. Your victims can still be saved,” Cordle says. Then a message appears on the darkened screen: “Make the promise to never drink and drive.”

A convicted drug smuggler serving time in a U.S. prison insisted Tuesday that a Windsor man on trial for exporting hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of ecstasy to Detroit, “knew what was going on” the day she was arrested.

In a second day of cross-examination in the Superior Court trial of Charbel Chibani, 34, the young woman alleged to have been acting as a drug mule insisted that Chibani was well aware of her trip through the Windsor-Detroit tunnel that ended with her arrest on Oct. 28, 2009.

Testifying from prison in Connecticut, Mary Ann Habib denied  suggestions by Chibani’s lawyer Laura Joy that her client sounded confused and didn’t know what was happening when Habib called him within hours of her arrest as part of a police “sting.”

Habib testified that as part of the sting she was to meet with a man on the U.S. side of the border who was believed to be awaiting delivery of the drugs and to call Chibani with new that the meeting had taken place.

She drove to Dearborn to meet with the American contact, a man named Moe, where he was arrested. Police then had the two suspects call Chibani in Windsor. However his part of the conversation was never recorded by police monitoring equipment because of a technical glitch.

Joy suggested Chibani never said anything that would implicate him in those communications, either with Habib or with Moe.

“Charbel was confused and didn’t know what was going on,” Joy suggested. “That was clear to you.”

“At that time he probably didn’t know what the next step was. He knew what was going on,” Habib replied. “He wouldn’t have picked up that phone. I wouldn’t say he didn’t know what was going on.”

She said that her phone had been ringing constantly from the time of her arrest and that the calls were from Chibani and another man alleged to have been involved in the scheme.

She said she saw Chibani’s number “pop up” when investigators, who had seized her cellphone, put it down in front of her in the interrogation room.

“It was going off the whole time while I was being interrogated,” Habib said. ” I saw it with my own eyes. It was him calling repeatedly…. I’m definitely not wrong about that.”

Joy pointed out that her client never said anything in those calls about drugs.

A breakaway group of Anglican parishioners in Windsor has been dealt another blow by the courts in the battle over ownership of a Wyandotte Street East church.

The Ontario Court of Appeal has dismissed the case involving a group of about 100 parishioners of St. Aidan’s church who broke away from the Anglican Church of Canada in 2008. A lower court ruled in 2011 that the church assets belong to the diocese of Huron, not the parishioners who amassed them.

The parishioners appealed the decision, and earlier this month had their appeal dismissed. The Ontario Court of Appeal worsened the blow, ruling the parishioners must pay $100,000 toward the diocese’s court costs in the lower court, as well as the diocese’s appeal costs which have yet to be determined.

“Does this seem fair?” said Peter Jervis, the Toronto lawyer who represented the parishioners in the suit. “Everything’s been taken from them….  And now these people have to pay for the privilege of giving their building away.”

The rift in the Anglican Church of Canada began more than a decade ago when ministers were first allowed to bless same-sex marriages. Since then, more conservative congregations began breaking away from the church because of this issue and other interpretations of Scripture, joining the Anglican Network in Canada. ANiC now boasts 70 parishes across Canada, including St. Aidan’s, according to its website.

Like other parishes, St. Aidan’s sued its diocese to gain control of the church building. In all cases, the courts have ruled the church assets belong to the diocese, not its parishioners. A trailblazing parish in British Columbia tried to take its case to the highest court in the country, but the Supreme Court of Canada refused to hear it.

Jervis said the B.C. case and the local one are based on a “different set of legal principles” involving laws governing trusts. He said the local group has the right of appeal and is still deciding whether to pursue it.

In the Windsor case, a Superior Court judge ruled that “in the interests of promoting harmony within the church,” each side would pay their own legal costs. The Court of Appeal has ruled that the judge erred, and that the parishioners should cover $100,000 of the more than $445,000 the diocese claimed as costs.

“Where’s the money going to come from? Well, from the Sunday school fund and other donations that would normally go to church activities,” Jervis said.

St. Aidan’s Anglican Parish was established in 1922 in what was then known as Ford City. In 1952, the parish purchased property on Wyandotte Street East for the church that is subject of the court dispute.

In 1978, the parishioners purchased the lot next to the church and in the late 1990s built an adjoining fellowship hall at a cost of $610,000. The mortgage has been paid off thanks to donations and fundraisers, including a 2001 bequest of more than $418,000 and the $157,000 sale of the parish rectory.

The fund was also used for building maintenance and other church expenses. The Ontario Court of Appeal has ruled whatever is left in the fund belongs to the diocese.

After the parish broke away from the Anglican Church of Canada, it continued to share the church with the diocese. The parishioners sued when the diocese tried to evict them.

ssacheli@windsorstar.com

There will be a new face on the bench in Windsor courtrooms.

Welland, Ont., lawyer Ronald Marion has been appointed a new judge of the Ontario Court of Justice. He leaves his home and practice of 30 years at the end of the October to take up his new post.

Marion, 64, has been a school board trustee and former chairman of the Ontario School Trustees Council and L’Association des Conseils Scolaires des Ecoles Publiques de l’Ontario. He has headed the legal advisory Committee at Niagara Child and Youth Services and has been a panel member of the Office of the Children’s Lawyer, representing children in Court since 1981. He has practised family, civil and criminal law in both English and French.

Marion, a father to four daughters, was called to the bar in 1976.

Steven Slade has taken to the Internet to counsel sexual conduct between children, brag about raping a 10-year-old boy and share fantasies about torturing a child for sexual pleasure.

Assistant Crown Gary Nikota is asking an Ontario court judge to designate Slade, 45, a dangerous offender, meaning the former Boy Scout leader could be kept behind bars indefinitely.

The former Windsor man was arrested last year at the Greyhound station, having travelled here from Toronto with the intention of having sex with a 14-year-old boy. When he was arrested, Slade was wearing a pair of white briefs with the words “Diaper Boy” written in capital letters across the backside. Below he had written the name of the boy he was coming to meet.

Only weeks earlier, Slade had been released from prison where he’d served a two-year term for Internet luring, distributing child pornography and counselling others to commit sexual offences involving children.

Testimony in Slade’s court hearing began Tuesday with the evidence of the first police officer to come across Slade on the Internet. Windsor police Det. Jason Belanger explained how he was tipped off about Slade in 2008 by a neighbour concerned about Slade’s proclivity for boys. The neighbour created a fictitious Facebook account in the name of Barry Bond. When Slade “took the bait,” the woman turned the account over to Belanger, court heard.

Belanger then created another persona – a 15-year-old boy named Jeremy – that was used to secure Slade’s convictions.

Belanger testified he was shocked when Slade initiated a chat with the Jeremy persona within days of being released from prison. Thinking Slade might have believed the Jeremy persona created years earlier was now of age, Belanger and his partner Jeff Taylor, used Jeremy to introduce Slade to a fictitious, younger stepbrother named Alex.

Taylor testified Tuesday that he controlled the Alex persona. Online, Alex shared Slade’s diaper fetish and other sexual fantasies. Slade gave Alex access to a photo sharing site where he’d posted nude photos of himself. In the two weeks before his arrest, Slade had exchanged 1,059 text messages with Alex.

With promises of sex with Alex in the bus station restroom, Taylor lured Slade to Windsor. Windsor police paid for the bus ticket, but Slade thought it had been purchased by the 14-year-old boy. When Slade got off the bus Feb. 1, 2012, and was arrested by police, he had no idea he’d been communicating with an officer all along. He asked Belanger, “Did Alex call you?”

In a videotaped interview with police, Slade said the meeting would have been his first sexual encounter with a child. All his online chats, including references to him raping a 10-year-old boy, were made up, he said. “I never physically touched these boys,” Slade told police.

Under questioning from Slade’s lawyer, Kevin Shannon, Belanger testified police tried to find the 10-year-old boy. They also tried to find the owner of soiled boys’ underwear discovered in Slade’s apartment at the time of his first arrest. “There is no evidence of live victims, is there?” asked Shannon.

Belanger agreed.

Slade’s hearing is expected to last the rest of the week and into future court dates yet to be set.

ssacheli@windsorstar.com

A Tecumseh man will spend weekends in jail after being convicted of making sexual advances toward a 15-year-old boy.

James Glendinning, 47, pleaded guilty to a charge of invitation to sexual touching. Under a plea bargain, charges of sexual exploitation and luring were withdrawn by the Crown.

Glendinning was sentenced to 14 days in jail to be served intermittently. Once his sentence is up, he will be on probation for three years.

Glendinning was arrested in January after sending lurid texts and making sexual comments to the teenage boy. The boy’s identity is protected by a publication ban.

For the next 10 years, Glendinning is not allowed to go near a school, daycare, park, public swimming pool, community centre or any other place where children are usually found. He also can’t do any paid or volunteer work involving children or otherwise have any contact with anyone under the age of 16.

For the next ten years, he will be on the national sex offender registry, the primary consequences of which are that he has to report to police and keep them up to date about his address and vehicle information. The registry is not public.

ssacheli@windsorstar.com

A former Windsor Catholic high school teacher guilty of having affairs with two female students has been released from prison.

Mark Christopher Baggio, 40, will be on parole until Jan. 9, 2015. The Parole Board of Canada confirmed Thursday that Baggio was released Sept. 10 as required by law, after serving two-thirds of his four-year sentence.

Baggio was convicted in 2008 of two counts of sexual assault, two counts of sexual exploitation and two counts of luring a child for affairs with two students between 2000 and 2005.

The court found that, while the affairs began when the girls were 13 and 15 years old and spanned their high school careers at F.J. Brennan, Baggio had begun grooming the girls for sexual relationships while they were still in grade school.

The parole board refused to divulge where Baggio is living. A parole document obtained by The Star indicates one of the conditions of Baggio’s release is that he not enter the Windsor area.

According to the parole board’s written decision, Baggio had lined up a job and a place to live before his release.

The written decision sheds some light on Baggio’s time behind bars. “There are no concerns with your institutional behaviour,” the board said, suggesting Baggio was a model prisoner. However, it did say he demonstrated “continued denial” of his crimes.

Baggio had been recommended for the “moderate intensity sex offender program” while behind bars, but was subsequently made to take a program for “deniers,” the document says. “Reports indicate you made gains in the program and your post-treatment risk was in the low range and would only be elevated if you had unsupervised access to children.”

Among the conditions of his release are that Baggio not be in the presence of anyone under the age of 18 or go near a shopping mall, school, park, swimming pool or other places were children are likely to congregate unless accompanied by an adult approved by his parole supervisor. The adult must be aware of Baggio’s criminal history, the parole board said.

Baggio is not to be employed or volunteer in any capacity where he has authority of someone under the age of 18.

Like at his trial, Baggio amassed “numerous letters of support from family and friends” that were considered by the parole board.

According to the sentence handed down by Superior Court Justice Joseph Quinn in January 2009, Baggio will be on the national sex offender registry for 20 years. The registry, used by police to track the location and vehicle information of convicted sex offenders, is not accessible to the public.

Baggio appealed the judge’s decision, winning a two-year delay in going to prison. His appeal was dismissed in January 2011.

Baggio taught religion and leadership and was a guidance counsellor. He also coached sports teams at Brennan.

His victims and their families sued him and his employer, Windsor-Essex Catholic District School Board, in the civil courts. The suits were settled for undisclosed amounts.

Baggio remained a teacher “in good standing” with the Ontario College of Teachers for nearly three years after the conviction. The College, the licensing body of teachers at publicly funded schools in the province, did not revoke his teaching certificate until October 2011.

Ontario’s education minister announced Thursday that the province is introducing new legislation that would force the college to automatically revoke the licence of any teacher found guilty of sexual abuse or crimes involving child pornography.

ssacheli@windsorstar.com

A Toronto-area man whose refusal to pay duty on a $10 bottle of champagne led to a search of his car and seizure of $16,000 worth of marijuana pleaded guilty Monday to a drug smuggling charge.

Isaiah Wiltshire, 29, of Mississauga, will appear in court Nov. 8 for a pre-sentence hearing.

Had Wiltshire decided to pay duty on the champagne he was bringing into Canada at the Ambassador Bridge, he likely would have driven away without incident, according to testimony Monday.

But court was told Wiltshire got into a dispute with Canada Customs officers after being ordered at primary inspection to pull over and pay duty on the bottle of bubbly he had declared.

The argument led to further inspection by officers, who found  marijuana in his jacket pocket, on the car floor and in plastic bags stuffed inside a large Toasted O’s cereal box in the back seat.

Wiltshire crossed the bridge into Canada just after midnight on Dec. 18, 2010, when he was pulled over to pay duty, said customs officer Kyle Raymond.

Raymond told Superior Court he was stationed inside the office of customs’ secondary inspection area when he overheard Wiltshire argue with a fellow officer, claiming he spent five nights in the U.S. and not an “overnight” visit as was noted by the primary inspection officer.

“The conversation was about the length of his trip and he was wondering why he had to pay tax when he was out (of the country) for so long,” Raymond said.

Raymond testified he intervened in an attempt to assist Wiltshire.

The officer said he told Wiltshire if there were enough clothes inside his vehicle to prove he had been gone for five nights, he would let him go without paying duty on the champagne.

But when the officer opened the door of Wiltshire’s rented vehicle — a Suzuki SX4 with Quebec plates — he was hit with a strong odour of marijuana, Raymond told the court.

Another officer found a small quantity of marijuana on the floor of the passenger seat. Raymond said he frisked Wiltshire and found more marijuana in his front jacket pocket.

Wiltshire was arrested and officers brought in a dog to search the car.

Four large Ziploc bags of nearly equal amounts of marijuana stuffed inside a cereal box were found on the rear seat — nearly 800 grams or just under two pounds.

Among other items found in the car was a business card with a marijuana leaf and the name Rocky, court was told.

Wiltshire had been facing a count of possession for the purpose of trafficking, but that charge was dropped by the Crown in exchange for his guilty plea Monday on the more serious charge of importing.

Earlier Monday, Wiltshire’s lawyer Brian Dube  argued the search of the vehicle was unreasonable because his client had been pulled over only to pay duty. He also argued any conversation his client had leading to a search of his car was self-incriminating and a violation of his charter rights.

During cross-examination, Dube asked Raymond whether he recalled Wiltshire saying, “it’s OK, it’s cool, I’ll pay” before officers checked his car.

Dube also suggested if his client was allowed to pay the duty, there would have been “no justification for you to go out there.”

Raymond said he did not recall exact conversations and that his aim was only to help Wiltshire by seeing if there were five days of clothes in the car.

“I give everyone fair treatment,” he said. “I was trying to verify whether he had five days of clothing to give him the opportunity to not pay the taxes (on the champagne). It was as simple as that.

“His (dispute) was the reason I went out to the car. I can’t play would have, could have. I can only comment on what I heard.”

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A Windsor courtroom broke out in gasps Tuesday at the suggestion that Windsor police Const. Kent Patrick Rice spend even a single day in jail for assaulting a young criminal.

Rice, a 14-year-veteran of the force, was found guilty in August for the February 2012 stairwell attack on Gladson Chinyangwa, then 20. In addition to pushing Chinyangwa to the ground and striking him with his hand, Rice kicked the young man as a surveillance camera in the low-income housing building recorded the altercation.

At Rice’s sentencing hearing Tuesday, defence lawyer Andrew Bradie argued that a just punishment would be a conditional discharge. That sentence would mean Rice would have no criminal record despite the finding of guilt and therefore would not automatically lose his job.

Windsor Police Const. Kent Rice leaves Ontario Provincial Court,  Sept. 24, 2013, in Windsor after his sentencing hearing for assaulting a 20-year- old man in an apartment building stairwell in February 2012. (DAN JANISSE/The Windsor Star)

But Crown prosecutor David Foulds argued for nothing short of a criminal record — a suspended sentence with probation at a minimum. He suggested a fine, a period of house arrest or — eliciting gasps from Rice’s family and friends — a day in jail at the maximum.

“There needs to be a conviction here,” said Foulds. Anything less, he said “would be contrary to the public interest.”

Had it not been for the video, Rice would have gotten away with the assault, Foulds argued. Even with the video, Rice pleaded not guilty.

Rice showed “no demonstration of remorse,” and has never apologized to Chinyangwa, Foulds said.

The sentencing hearing ended with Rice reading a prepared statement in court.

“I wear my uniform with pride.”

He spoke of how “heartwrenching” it is to hear his children ask, ‘Daddy, are you still going to be a police officer?’”

He repeatedly referred to the assault as “the event,” apologizing that it has   “tarnished the reputation” of the police force and the city as a whole.

But he stopped short of taking any responsibility for it, never apologizing for his actions or to his victim.

Chinyangwa was led into the courtroom by a police officer to watch the sentencing hearing in the morning. He did not return after the lunch break.

Chinyangwa is currently in jail, awaiting sentencing on five  crimes. In October, he will be sentenced for two break-ins, a theft and two counts of breach of probation.

Chinyangwa took the witness stand, looked out at the crowded courtroom and then asked in a soft-spoken voice for the prosecutor to read a statement on his behalf.

Chinyangwa wrote of how Rice’s crime has affected his life. “I’m not perfect. I’ve made mistakes,” Chinyangwa  said.

Everyone knows about his criminal record now and, because of his distinctive last name, his parents can’t go anywhere without people asking about him.

Chinyangwa said he fears retribution by police officers.

“I no longer feel safe in the city of Windsor. I feel the police department is out to get me.”

Watch the surveillance video.

Some of Rice’s supporters scoffed audibly in the courtroom when Chinyangwa, who is black, said he felt he was singled out by Rice because of his race.

For the sentencing hearing, Rice solicited letters of support from friends, family and co-workers. Some declared that Rice is not racist.

Rice’s lawyer read excerpts from 113 pages of letters of support. There was a letter identifying him a blood donor, another from the minor hockey league where he coaches his son’s team. But most were from colleagues  and family friends who spoke of Rice as an exemplary police officer and mentor.

They all spoke of the assault as an aberration, some asking the court not to judge Rice by this single event.

Rice’s lawyer said the two kicks the officer delivered to Chinyangwa “lasted 20 seconds.” Bradie said that can’t be compared to “14 years of unblemished service.”

Ontario court Justice Donald Downie will sentence Rice Wednesday. He is the same judge who granted Windsor police Const. Brad Snyder a conditional discharge in 2010 after accepting the officer’s guilty plea for a 2009 assault .

Snyder, a former Olympic shot putter, beat a man in handcuffs who had been walking near the casino. Snyder rained forearm blows down on the man’s head and delivered knee strikes to his lower body after pinning him against a police van.

Like in the Rice case, Andrew Bradie defended Snyder and David Foulds prosecuted him.

The Snyder case was one of three police brutality cases referred to in court Tuesday. The other two – from other jurisdictions – resulted in suspended sentences and probation with criminal records for the officers involved.

Rice still faces charges under the Police Act. His lawyer said Windsor police are seeking his dismissal.

Rice has been suspended with pay since video of the assault was made public in June 2012.

ssacheli@windsorstar.com or on Twitter @WinStarSacheli

For an updated story with reaction videos, click here.

Windsor police Const. Kent Rice has been sentenced to probation for one year for assaulting a young criminal in February 2012.

The judge said “it would not be in the public interest to grant a conditional discharge” but stopped short of granting a custodial sentence.

A jail sentence would have automatically cost Rice his job. As it is, his badge is in jeopardy.

Rice, a 14-year-veteran of the force, was found guilty in August for the February 2012 stairwell attack on Gladson Chinyangwa, then 20. In addition to pushing Chinyangwa to the ground and striking him with his hand, Rice kicked the young man as a surveillance camera in the low-income housing building recorded the altercation.

At Rice’s sentencing hearing Tuesday, defence lawyer Andrew Bradie argued that a just punishment would be a conditional discharge. That sentence would mean Rice would have no criminal record despite the finding of guilt and therefore would not automatically lose his job.

But Crown prosecutor David Foulds argued for nothing short of a criminal record — a suspended sentence with probation at a minimum. He suggested a fine, a period of house arrest or — eliciting gasps from Rice’s family and friends — a day in jail at the maximum.“There needs to be a conviction here,” said Foulds. Anything less, he said “would be contrary to the public interest.”

Awaiting on the judge to enter the courtroom for the sentencing of Windsor police Const. Kent Rice.—
S Sacheli (@WinStarSacheli) September 25, 2013

The judge has just entered the courtroom.—
S Sacheli (@WinStarSacheli) September 25, 2013

Rice was convicted of assaulting Gladson Chinyangwa in a Feb. 2012 incident in a stairwell.—
S Sacheli (@WinStarSacheli) September 25, 2013

The judge is referring to other cases of police brutality. Mixed bag as to whether the officer ends up with a criminal record.—
S Sacheli (@WinStarSacheli) September 25, 2013

Judge says Rice is "eligible" for a conditional discharge, which means he would not have a record and automatically lose his job.—
S Sacheli (@WinStarSacheli) September 25, 2013

Judge now talking about "the public interest" as a factor in sentencing.—
S Sacheli (@WinStarSacheli) September 25, 2013

Judge: "It would not be in the public interest to grant a conditional discharge."—
S Sacheli (@WinStarSacheli) September 25, 2013

A conviction means Rice's badge is in jeopardy. Jail would have cost him his job automatically.—
S Sacheli (@WinStarSacheli) September 25, 2013

This is harsher than what Windsor Police Const. Brad Snyder got for his assault of a handcuffed man.—
S Sacheli (@WinStarSacheli) September 25, 2013

A Windsor police officer captured on surveillance video kicking a man in a stairwell will have a criminal record.

Const. Kent Patrick Rice, 41, was handed a suspended sentence with probation Tuesday for the February 2012 assault on Gladson Chinyangwa.

Rice, a 14-year veteran of the Windsor police service, had asked Ontario court Justice Donald Downie to give him a conditional discharge, sparing him a criminal record.

But Downie said the public, having watched Rice’s case in the media over the past 15 months, expects more.

“It would not be in the public interest to grant a conditional discharge,” Downie said.

Rice was captured on video beating a young black man in the stairwell of a low-income housing building. A member of the housing association’s board made the video public four months later, first bringing it to The Star, then to the branch of Windsor police that investigates allegations of misconduct within its ranks.

Police tracked down Chinyangwa, who had never complained, and had Rice charged criminally.

Rice will be on probation for one year. He must perform 60 hours of community service and take whatever counselling is recommended by his probation officer.

Rice offered no comment as he left the courthouse hand-in-hand with his wife of 17 years, Kim.

Rice’s lawyer, Andrew Bradie, said an appeal is “under consideration.”

Rice has never apologized to Chinyangwa because the officer feels he did nothing wrong, Bradie said.

He said Rice “stands by his actions” and was “devastated” when the judge found him guilty.

The added problem of a criminal conviction on sentencing will hurt Rice in an upcoming Police Act hearing where the officer is charged with discreditable conduct and using excessive force.

“It would have been more helpful if (the judge) would have granted him a discharge,” Bradie said.

Jason DeJong, president of the Windsor Police Association, expressed disappointment about the sentence.

“It has an impact on morale,” he said. “It’s disheartening to the association and the membership.”

DeJong took offence to Chinyangwa’s statement to the court about fearing retribution from police officers.

“I think that’s an absolutely ridiculous statement,” DeJong said. “He has absolutely nothing to fear, just like any other member of the community.”

Court heard the service wants to get Rice off the force.

Insp. John St. Louis said the police service will move quickly to get Rice’s Police Act hearing underway.

The proceedings had been postponed pending the resolution of the criminal case. St. Louis said the prosecutor will have that stay lifted as soon as possible.

St. Louis said this incident erodes public trust. Officers work hard to earn the public’s trust, he said, but “trust is a fragile commodity.”

Rice will continue to be suspended with pay, as mandated by law, St. Louis said.

“It’s a serious matter for us to have somebody with a conviction registered like that. It’s not a good day.”

ssacheli@windsorstar.com